


The Baker

by BenjisCoolTimes



Category: Parks and Recreation
Genre: Bakery AU, F/M, Fluff, Pastry Chef, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-11 22:39:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9037766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BenjisCoolTimes/pseuds/BenjisCoolTimes
Summary: Ben Wyatt was a pastry chef for fourteen years, and he was living a very ordinary life, but the day Leslie Knope stepped foot into his bakery, it became anything but that.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fourthinobesity](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fourthinobesity/gifts).



> Happy Chanukah, Rae!!!!!!!!!! You are a wonderful person, and I'm so happy we became friends this year! I hope you enjoy this fic :)

The day that he met her, he had flour in his hair.

It probably had something to do with the numerous times he’d run his hands through it in stress, trying to get all of his baking orders done on time so that Chris wouldn’t yell at him…Not that Chris would ever actually raise his voice, but the disappointment veiled in dripping optimism was somehow even worse. Needless to say, Ben’s hair had been especially wild that day, sticking up on every end. In fact, you could’ve held up any picture of Albert Einstein next to his head and reasonably concluded that they were twins just based on their hair alone. 

And maybe based a little bit on how good they both were at math as well. 

Because believe it or not, Ben had actually majored in accounting years ago; he’d finished top in his program and everything, and was valedictorian of his class at Purdue. That seemed to surprise a lot of people, considering how he was now barely scraping by, working at a local bakery and frosting a bazillion cupcakes a day, but he didn’t mind. He actually liked his job. He liked how precise baking was; liked that everything had an exact measurement and a recipe to follow. 

It made for less human disaster moments than usual. 

Ben had always done well with schedule, routine. Every time he was given the opportunity to go off the rails a bit, he wanted nothing more than to just get right back on them again. He’d learned that lesson after Ice Town, learned that there were just some things that he could do and some that he could not. That was why he never let himself venture too far away from his comfort zone, because in the real world, there were no safety nets. 

There were only teenagers egging your windows at 3:00 in the morning and protestors stopping your parents in the bread aisle to tell them what a failure their son was for bankrupting an entire town. 

So Ben was perfectly happy to live out each day like he’d lived the last, with no spontaneity in between. He was happy to wake up at seven each morning and be back in bed by ten each night. He knew that he was a walking, talking version of clockwork, and he’d always been more than alright with that. 

Until suddenly, he was not.

Because the day he met her, the day he had flour in his hair and specks of chocolate on his chin, he didn’t want to be average anymore. 

He wanted to be extraordinary. 

***

When Ben first started working at The Cookie Jar, he was surprised to find that Chris never actually ate any of the pastries they made. Now though, the very thought of Chris putting a donut even three feet in front of his face was almost comical; he was too obsessed with the idea of being fit and too paranoid with the idea of becoming even remotely unhealthy to do anything of the sort. 

Ben learned early on that Chris had inherited the shop from his father, who’d passed away suddenly before he could actually open it. Chris took his job very seriously for that reason and insisted on living out his father’s legacy for him, since he couldn't be there to do it himself.

Ben didn’t actually join the team until two years after opening, when some guy named Paul had bailed because business wasn’t doing well. That’s when Ben’d stepped in, a year out of college and looking to pay off some student loans. Honestly, he’d applied for the job in desperation and was more surprised than anyone when he actually landed it. He still wasn't quite sure why Chris gave it to him, considering he had absolutely no baking experience whatsoever. Chris insisted it was because he _liked Ben’s energy,_ but Ben thought it was all bullshit. His best guess was that no one else even applied. 

But he was thankful for the job just the same. And now he had fourteen years of experience under his belt, and he was actually pretty good, if he did say so himself. Maybe that was why he never actually left, never actually decided to pursue an accounting career, because this was normal now, and anything else would just feel too risky. 

And like he said: he liked his job; it was perfect for right now, and that was good enough as far as he was concerned. 

So, he found himself flipping the open sign over and settling on the stool behind the register, just as he did any other day, not particularly aware that today would be any different. He was decorating cupcakes when the first few customers trickled in, his tongue darting out of his mouth in concentration as he tried to get the flower petals just right. 

She didn’t actually come in until three. Before that the day had been uneventful, ordinary, but from the moment the bell over the door signaled her entrance, it became anything but that. 

“I have a cake disaster!!” she screamed, causing Ben to promptly drop the icing bag he was holding and bite his tongue in surprise. She came bustling in, carrying far too many binders for one person. Her  blonde hair was piled in a messy bun on top of her head, and her sunglasses were askew on her face, giving her an altogether very frazzled appearance.

“You have a what now?” he asked, more concerned about the possibility that she’d caused him to mess up the cupcake he’d been working on than anything else; it’d been a really good flower too.

“A cake disaster!” she reiterated, dropping everything she was holding onto a nearby table with a thud and turning to face him with arms flailing. “And Ann’s birthday is tomorrow! I don't know what to do!”

 “Uhh…”

“My usual cake guy is on vacation this week, and so I tried to make my own, but it wasn't nearly as good as his are, and this has to be perfect! It has to be perfect for Ann, okay?!” 

She was now pacing the entire length of the room. Her blazer had been shrugged off and thrown on top of all of her other things and her hair was somehow in even more of a disarray.

“Well, if you tell me what you want, I can most likely have it ready for pick-up at twelve-thirty tomorrow,” he suggested calmly, hoping that his tone would be enough to soothe her. Just seeing her this worked up was enough to get his own nerves going, and that was the last thing he needed after Chris had come in two hours ago, pushing him to work faster so that all of his orders would actually be done by the end of the day. 

“But that’s the thing! I don't know what I want!” she said, finally stopping her half-marathon around the room and turning to face him. “I just really want this day to be perfect. I feel like I’ve been ignoring Ann lately because things have been so hectic with my City Council campaign, and I just want to make her birthday amazing.” 

“Uh, right,” he nodded, pulling his notepad and pen closer to him and gesturing for her to take a seat at the counter. “We’ll brainstorm then.” 

Ben didn’t know why he suggested it. Normally he made it his life’s mission to avoid as much public interaction as possible, but there was no denying that there was something about her, something that made him actually want to talk to her and help out. Maybe it was because she was kind of pretty, and she had these really nice blue eyes, which he liked.

And she was running for City Council apparently, which somehow only made her even prettier. 

“Really?” she asked, eyes softening and a smile stretching across her face. She pulled a chair in front of the counter and sank down into it with a single binder in hand. “I’d love that! Thank you.” 

“Sure. Now, what kind of cake were you thinking? Let’s start there.” 

“That’s a ridiculous question. Chocolate of course,” she said, flipping her binder open. She wasn’t exactly joking, but her tone wasn't mean either, and it made Ben duck his head down, grateful that she was too focused on her extensive notes to even notice his smile. It was almost like she actually didn’t think anyone ate any type of cake but chocolate, and it was weirdly adorable. 

“Right.” He nodded, jotting her answer down in messy script. “And how big did you need the cake to be?” 

“Big enough to feed eight people,” she told him, and he was halfway through writing her answer down when she suddenly stopped him, shaking her head so viciously that a strand of hair fell from her bun. “No, nine, sorry. I always forget about Jerry.

It was also weirdly adorable how she acted like he actually knew all the people she was talking about.

_Wait, what was he saying?_

He didn’t find women adorable. Once every couple of years he’d have a one night stand, and that’d always been enough for him; he hadn’t really been overly interested in actually dating anyone in years, not since Cindy. 

He cleared his throat. “Okay. Do you know what you want to put on the cake? We can do just about anything here.” 

“Well at first, I was thinking of a mermaid with a blue seashell bra, and then above it in purple icing, you could write ‘Happy Birthday You Beautiful and Poetic Land Mermaid’, but I’m not sure if that’s the right option yet. What do you think?”

“It’s a good start,” he murmured, already in the process of drawing a rough sketch of the idea. Turned out, he was really bad at drawing mermaids. Where did their stomachs end and tails begin? 

Were they called tails? Or fins?

“Something like this?” he asked, pushing the finished product over to her. She studied it for several moments, eyes narrowed.

“Yes, but with more…oomph.” She widened her eyes and clenched her fists as if that would help him to understand what exactly _oomph_ was supposed to mean. “Like a bunch of fish swimming around and balloons in the sky or something. It has to be-”

“Perfect. I know,” he finished for her. They brainstormed for an hour and a half more, until finally, he slid over a piece of paper with insane drawings all over it, and her whole face lit up. 

“Yes! This is the one!” she said, sighing in relief. “Thank you so much. I’m so happy I could kiss you right now!” 

_Yes, please do that._

_No wait, don’t. He didn’t need that kind of attachment in his life right now._

“You’re welcome.” He shrugged, trying to hide the blush that creeped up his neck and onto his cheeks. “Come by around 12:30 tomorrow, and I’ll have it ready by then.” 

“Okay.” She smiled and thanked him one last time before gathering up all of her stuff, and it wasn’t until her hand was on the doorknob that she actually turned back to face him again, eyes sparkling. “Oh, and you have flour in your hair, just so you know.” 

And then the bell rang, and she was gone in just as much of a whirlwind as she came. 

It wasn't until that exact moment that he realized he’d never even learned her name.

***

The second time that he saw her, he made absolute sure that there wasn’t a single trace of flour in his hair. 

He sat in his usual stool behind the counter, twiddling his thumbs absently and neglecting all of his other duties as he waited for her to come in. It was 12:00 right on the nose, and he’d finished her cake exactly twenty minutes ago, almost a full hour ahead of schedule. He was actually pretty proud of his work, and he should've been, considering it took him thirteen tries to actually get the mermaid right. 

Because it had to be perfect. For Ann, of course. 

The bell over the door rang ten minutes later, and there she was. 

She was just as pretty as she was yesterday, which both excited and irritated Ben at the same time, but she was more put together this time. Her hair fell in soft ringlets around her face, and her pantsuit made her look sharp, intelligent.

Sexy. 

“Hey,” she said with a wave, and Ben found himself smiling. 

“Hi. Your order is in the back. I’ll go get it for you.” 

Right before he disappeared into the back room, he saw her take the same chair at the counter that she’d taken yesterday, folding her hands patiently into her lap. She looked around the bakery, as if realizing it for the first time, and Ben wasn't surprised. She’d been in such a frenzy yesterday, that he doubted she actually had time to see the entire room for what it was. 

When he came back out, cake in hand, she was standing again, this time peering into one of the pastry display cases with interest. 

“Would you like something from there too?” he asked. “I made some pretty mean cookies yesterday, if I do say so myself.” 

“I was actually looking at this slice of red velvet…” she tapped on the glass, biting her lip. “Do you think I could get a piece?”

“You want cake with your cake?”

“You can never have too much.” 

“Actually, you can,” he reasoned as he wrapped up her individual order with a smile. “Ever heard of this little thing called diabetes?” 

“Oh, if I was going to get diabetes, I would’ve gotten it by now,” she retorted, matching his smile with one of her own. It lit up the entire room, and essentially won her the argument because Ben was now too distracted by her lips to even think of a proper comeback. 

“Well, uh, here you go,” he said instead, sliding both boxes over to her. She gave him her credit card, and he gave her a small discount, even though he knew Chris would kill him if he ever found out. 

“Thank you for this,” she said, holding up the much smaller box. “I know it wasn’t originally on the order.”

“Oh that? That was a _piece of cake.”_ Ben grimaced at his own attempt at a joke, but she just laughed; it was more of a cackle actually, and it tugged at the corners of his own mouth. 

“I love puns!” she said. 

“Well, I’m full of them.” 

“Yeah? What else do you got?” she asked, leaning over the counter and balancing her head in her hands. 

“Uh.” Ben glanced around the room, looking for inspiration, and finding next to none. Leslie giggled as he fumbled for words, and he strung together the first sentence he could come up with, blushing furiously as he gestured towards the treats in the display case. “When you play the game of scones, you win, or you die.” 

He did his best Joffrey impersonation; he really did, but didn’t sound as good as it had in his head, and even he couldn't help but to snort at his less than stellar effort. 

“Wow, a Game of Thrones reference?” she asked cheekily. “Really? _That_ was the best you could do?” 

“Shut up! I doubt you could've done any better.” 

“Oh, I could have done wayyyyy better,” she taunted. She pushed herself off the counter and grabbed both pink boxes in front of her, backing towards the door slowly.

“Prove it.” 

“Oh, I’ll prove it to you when you _yeast_ expect it,” she said, throwing a wink over her shoulder and pushing out the door. The bell jingled and then Ben was left alone in the silence once more.

That’s when he realized he still didn’t know her name. 

And that he really, really wanted to.

***

She didn’t come in again for three full days. 

He hadn’t even been expecting her to, honestly. She’d said that she had a usual cake guy after all, so why would she? It didn’t exactly benefit her to be here at all. 

But she was here just the same, wearing yet another pantsuit and a smile that could rival anyone’s; here instead of at her usual bakery, which oddly made Ben’s chest swell with pride. 

“Hi!” Chris said from besides him. “Welcome to The Cookie Jar. What can I do for you?” 

“Oh, I’m actually here to see him,” she said, pointing at Ben. “He made me a wonderful cake the other day, and I wanted to properly thank him.” 

“Awesome!! I’ll leave you two to it!” Chris said, offering her his trademark finger guns before slipping into his jacket and practically running out the door, more than ready for his afternoon marathon. 

That was typical Chris for you- step into the bakery for ten minutes and then leave abruptly so that Ben can juggle all of the actual work on his own. 

“Um, who was that guy?” she asked, giggling. 

“Oh, that’s just Chris. He owns the place, but he never stays very long,” Ben said, wiping the counter down with a rag to make it look like he was actually doing something. “How was Ann’s birthday?” 

“Amazing, and it’s all thanks to you.” 

“Well, I’m sure it isn't _all_ thanks to me. I bet lots of other planning went into this, like banners and confetti?” Ben scrubbed at a particularly stubborn spot before raising his head to look at her, eyebrow raised in question. 

“How is it that you already know me so well, Mister Baker, sir?” 

“Ben.” He smirked. 

“I’m Leslie Knope,” she said, holding her hand over the counter for him to shake. When he took it, he found that her skin was soft and he absently began to wonder if it was like that everywhere, or just there. He dropped her hand as soon as the thought crossed his mind, but she didn’t seem to notice his sudden panic. 

_Leslie. Her name was Leslie._

“Nice to meet you,” he said. “Can I get you anything while you’re here? Another piece of red velvet cake maybe?” 

“Hmm,” she craned her neck to see the display case, finger tapping on her lips in thought. “Are you out of cupcakes?” 

“There’s a batch that I just took out of the oven a little while ago. They should be cool enough to frost by now if you want to wait for a few minutes?” 

“Okay.” She slid into the chair at the counter, and Ben disappeared into the back to retrieve the rack of cupcakes, bringing them back out to the front, along with several colors of icing. He settled into his own stool directly in front of her, and retied his apron behind his back before getting to work. 

This, strangely enough, was one of his favorite parts of the job; nothing was more satisfying than squeezing icing out of a bag and watching it fall, almost in slow motion, onto pastries. Leslie was so quiet while he worked, that he almost forgot she was there altogether, and it wasn't until she spoke that he actually looked up at her. 

“I’ve always wanted to do that,” she said, gesturing to what he was doing. “It looks so fun.” 

“You’ve never done it before?” he questioned, surprised. 

She shook her head, curls bouncing back and forth; it was oddly transfixing. 

“Well, come around the counter, and I’ll show you how it’s done. Everyone should experience this at least once in their lifetime.” 

_Stop, stop, abort mission! No cute girls should be allowed behind the counter!!_

“Really?” she asked, eyes lighting up like they held the sun. Ben nodded, and she nearly knocked over about ten different things in a scurry to get to him. 

“Here,” he said, reaching behind himself to grab an apron off the rack. He slipped the loop over her head with a smile, and she turned around so that he could tie the strings behind her back. “I wouldn’t want to get this blazer of yours dirty.” 

She thanked him with a smile over her shoulder and grabbed the nearest icing bag. “Alright, baking master, impart unto me your wisdom, please!” 

“Okay, young Padawan,” Ben said, sliding a cupcake in front of her and one in front of himself. “The first thing you want to do is make sure that you don’t squeeze too hard. It makes it too difficult to control where the icing is actually going that way.”

“I see,” Leslie said, ever the attentive student. 

“And when you’re squeezing, make sure you squeeze from the top of the bag, not down here,” he said, using the opportunity to move her hands into the correct positions. “Like this.” 

Her hands were so tiny underneath his big ones, and Ben wanted nothing more than to turn them over and burn each freckle and crevice into memory.

“Okay.” 

“Why don’t you try one now?” he suggested. 

She bit her lip in concentration and applied far too much pressure to the tube, sending icing halfway across the counter and absolutely nowhere near the intended target. The cupcake stood, bare as ever, on the counter in front of her, and Leslie stared wide-eyed at the mess she’d made, but Ben laughed from next to her. 

“No it’s more like this,” he said through a chuckle, coming up from behind her and securing his hands over hers. It wasn't until after he’d squeezed lightly and moved their hands in a circular motion over the cupcake, that he realized just how close they really were.

He could’ve kissed the base of her neck with ease, and he wondered if she could feel his breath there, lingering, longing.

“Oh,” she said softly, and Ben knew that she felt it too, the sudden shift in the air. 

He didn’t move his hands away, even though the cupcake was frosted by now; honestly he forgot about it altogether, more focused on the hitch in Leslie’s breath. 

He shouldn't kiss people he’d just met, right? 

He coughed uncomfortably and pulled away, smoothing his hands over the front of his apron just to give them something to do. She turned to face him, a small smile playing at her lips, and he was surprised to find that her cheeks were slightly flushed.

“Thank you for, um…” Leslie motioned to the cupcake, but the rest of her sentence trailed off. 

“Yeah, yeah of course.” He rubbed at the back of his neck and slid the cupcake they’d just decorated together closer to her. “For you, madame.” 

She smiled and peeled the pastry from it’s wrapper, taking a generous bite which left icing at the corner of her mouth. The moan that escaped her lips caused Ben to promptly sit down, so that the entire countertop shielded his…lower regions from her view. 

God, what was this woman doing to him?

“Let me take you to dinner tonight!” he blurted out, and then immediately felt his face grow red at the outburst. 

What the hell was he doing?!

Leslie’s eyes grew very wide, but in the same second, they softened, and she picked at a loose thread on her shirt, suddenly shy.

“Okay. Pick me up from City Hall at seven.”

And then she gathered up her things and walked out the door, leaving a very stunned Ben to finally catch up on what had just happened.

He realized then, that he was already falling for Leslie Knope. Hard.

And that most certainly was never supposed to happen. 

He had flour in his hair when he first met her, after all. 

**Author's Note:**

> I HOPE YOU LIKED THIS RAE!! I LOVE YOU LOTS <3


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